With Matt Harvey working his way back from Tommy John surgery and Jon Niese likely to be held back for the second series of the regular season due to elbow inflammation, Adam Rubin of ESPN New York reported this morning that Dillon Gee will start for the Mets on Opening Day against the Nationals on March 31.

“He’s probably the lead guy because of his success against the Nationals,” Collins said about Gee. “And, to be honest, no disrespect to Bartolo [Colon] or anybody else, but this guy has won more games, I think, for us in three years than anybody on the staff. We’re kind of leaning that way.”

There was some speculation that offseason addition Bartolo Colon or perhaps young right-hander Zack Wheeler would get the nod, but Gee has more seniority with the team than either of them. The 27-year-old is also coming off a very solid season where he posted a 3.62 ERA over a career-high 32 starts. He was at risk of losing his rotation spot in late May, but he rattled off a 2.71 ERA over his final 22 outings.

He actually said, “won more games for us” meaning he has a good past with the Mets. It sounded to me like Collins is starting him out of respect, not only because of his number of wins. He wants to give the start a guy who has been with the team for a while over a guy (Colon) who just arrived this year.